World News | California: Criminal Rings Loot Billions in Jobless Funds
Get latest articles and stories on World at LatestLY. California officials say hackers, identity thieves and overseas criminal rings stole an estimated dollar 11.4 billion in unemployment benefits last year.
Los Angeles, Jan 26 (AP) California officials say hackers, identity thieves and overseas criminal rings stole an estimated dollar 11.4 billion in unemployment benefits last year.
But the extent of the fraud might grow far larger: billions more in jobless payments are under investigation.
California Labor Secretary Julie Su told reporters in a conference call Monday that of the dollar 114 billion the state has paid in unemployment claims during that time, about 10% has been confirmed as fraudulent.
Nearly dollar 20 billion more is considered suspicious, and a large part could be confirmed as fraud.
Su says the state did not have sufficient security measures in place and criminals took advantage of the gaps. (AP)
(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)